MySpot: Brasov - The Walls of My Castle are Broken

"All day long we seemed to dawdle through a country which was full of beauty of every kind. 
Sometimes we saw little towns or castles on the top of steep hills such as we see in old missals; 

sometimes we ran by rivers and streams 
which seemed from the wide stony margin on each side of them to be subject of great floods."

Bram Stoker

Bran, Dracula's Castle IV - You Must Not Be Alone...

"I am longing to be with you, 

and by the sea, 

where we can talk together freely and build our castles in the air."

Bram Stoker - Dracula

Brasov - City Landmarks

The Black Church, Brasov's famous landmark and Romania's leading Gothic church, 

was built between 1385 and 1477.

The church was given its new name after disaster struck again in 1689, 

when the Great Fire leveled most of the town, blackening the walls of the church. 

Restoration took almost 100 years. 

Strategically located on a hill overlooking the town and the plains to the north, 

the Fortress was part of Brasov's outer fortification system. 

Built in wood in 1524, it was replaced with a stone structure in the 16th century, 

only to be abandoned in the 17th century after technological innovations made cannons stronger than the building.  

Of the original seven bastions, only a few have survived, 

including the newly renovated Graft Bastion, located in the middle of the citadel's northwest wing. 

On the west side of the wall, walk along picturesque Dupa Ziduri Street (Dupa Ziduri means Behind the Walls).

Catherine's Gate, erected in 1559 by the Tailors' Guild, 

is the only original gate to have survived from medieval times. 

The fairy-tale tower we see today was part of a bigger structure, 

which unfortunately, was demolished in 1827.

Above the entrance, the tower bears the city's coat of arms: a crown on a tree trunk. 

Bran, Dracula's Castle III - Courtyard Far Below...

"Suddenly, I became conscious of the fact that the driver was in the act of pulling up the horses 
in the courtyard of a vast ruined castle, 

from whose tall black windows came no ray of light, 

and whose broken battlements showed a jagged line against the sky."

Bram Stoker - Dracula

Bran - Dracula's Castle

"The view was magnificent, and from where I stood there was every opportunity of seeing it. 
The castle is on the very edge of a terrific precipice. 

A stone falling from the window would fall a thousand feet without touching anything! 

As far as the eye can reach is a sea of green tree tops, with occasionally a deep rift where there is a chasm. 

Here and there are silver threads where the rivers wind in deep gorges through the forests.

But I am not in heart to describe beauty, for when I had seen the view I explored further; 
doors, doors, doors everywhere, and all locked and bolted. 

In no place save from the windows in the castle walls is there an available exit.

The castle is a veritable prison, and I am a prisoner!"

Bram Stoker - Dracula